Joshua 24:11
And ye went over Jordan, and came unto Jericho: and the men of Jericho fought against you, the Amorites, and the Perizzites, and the Canaanites, and the Hittites, and the Girgashites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites; and I delivered them into your hand.
This verse belongs to Joshua's final recounting of Israel's history since they were called as God's people, given as he was laying down his work near the end of his life. The infirmities of age were upon him and he was about to lay his responsibilities upon the representative men of the nation. The tribes assembled at his call at Shechem.
Shechem was a place with sacred associations that carried their minds back to God's covenant with Abraham and Jacob and to their own solemn vows upon entering Canaan. The mountains Ebal and Gerizim stood as silent witnesses of those vows which they had now assembled to renew in the presence of their dying leader. The verse recalls going over the Jordan to Jericho as part of the conquest after crossing the Jordan, with God bringing Israel into Canaan. The men of Jericho and the peoples of the land fought against them, and God delivered them into Israel's hand, as part of the record of the Lord giving Israel rest from its enemies.
The gift of a land for which they did not labor, and cities which they did not build, and vineyards and oliveyards which they did not plant, was set before them as evidence on every side of what God had wrought for them and of His love and mercy. The review presents God's providential care throughout the journey and victories alongside Israel's failures, murmurings, and failure to follow God's revealed will. It was meant to lead Israel to gratitude and humility. The review was a stand to strengthen the faith of God's people by reviewing past blessings and mercies, recalling the crossing of the Jordan and God's delivering of the enemies at Jericho into their hand as proof of the power of His word in the past.
Joshua used this history to urge gratitude and humility and then to warn against idolatry and all compromising ties with idolaters, including intermarriage, because such contact could corrupt them. Leaving and turning from God brings desolation, while God is faithful both to keep His promises and to carry out His warnings. Israel's history was meant to teach the same lesson to each person: to avoid even the borders of sin.
This rehearsal of past experience is an example for those who have had experience in God's dealings in the rise and progress of the work to follow by recounting past mercies, the sacrifices of those who led out, the simplicity of the early workers, and the power of God manifested to keep the work free from error and delusion and extravagance. Doing this blesses those who tell it and proves a blessing and molding influence to workers who have not had that experience. Remembering what the Lord has done in the past keeps His present working in their behalf in sight, and teaches present workers to carry the work forward in the same humble spirit and with the same self-sacrificing principles that characterized the true worker in the past. The rehearsal is an example to be followed today by repeating and repeating the instruction and understanding of truth God has given His people, because Satan is working to make that testimony of no effect and to unsettle confidence.